"Thank you," she said softly.
"And I'm going to read for a while longer. I trust that won't bother you?"
She shook her head. "I'm kinda too wound up to sleep. Mind if I get my knitting?"
He shrugged his shoulders and climbed into his side of the bed, grabbing his book and opening it back up again, ignoring her. This was perfect, really. If he was going to pretend like she wasn't there, she wouldn't feel so weird about asking to sleep with him.
Maylee bounded up from the bed and went to her room, grabbed her knitting, and scurried back into his room. For some reason, her own hotel room didn't feel safe anymore, but the moment she walked through his door, she felt like she could relax. Breathing a happy sigh of relief, she bounded back into bed, dragged the blankets up around her, and then sat up, crossed her legs, and began to knit. The feel of the yarn and the needles was soothing to her, as were the repetitive motions. It allowed her to calm down and relax, and she began to chain her yarn with easy motions.
She glanced over at Griffin, but he was silent, reading a book with tons of tiny words on the page. Looked like heavy reading. Huh. Interesting that he was so smart when he didn't have to be. She went back to her knitting.
A comfortable silence fell between them for a long time.
"Why are you afraid to sleep by yourself?"
Maylee glanced over, and was startled to see that he was looking in her direction. His thick book was flat on that divine chest, and his hair had dried into a light brown tousle that looked different now that it wasn't slicked down by a pound of hair gel. He looked different. Younger. Easier to approach.
Cute, even.
She felt herself blushing, though she continued to knit, her needles moving. "You really want to know?"
"Would I have inquired if I didn't?"
"You might if you were just being polite."
He snorted. "I can assure you that I don't ask people about themselves unless I'm interested."
She supposed that was the case. "I guess I should be mighty flattered then, huh? And it's nothing big, really. My apartment got broken into when I first moved to the city. I'd only been in New York a few days. I went on a job interview and when I came back, someone had broken in my door and gone through all my stuff."
"Did you go to the police?"
"I went to my landlord," she admitted, looping her yarn around one needle as she spoke. "He told me that since he was only charging me three dollars a square foot, I shouldn't expect much. So I just had him fix the door and I got myself a baseball bat, but it was scary for the first few days."
He was silent. She looked over from her knitting to see him frowning at her.
"What?" she asked.
"I don't know what part of that story is the most ridiculous. I'm trying to decide."
"I can't help if I was scared," she said defensively. "It was the first time I'd ever left home, and then someone came through and raided my stuff. It was rather alarming for a girl from Arkansas."
"I would suppose so." He sat up and leaned against the headboard. "That's not the ridiculous part. You're being charged three dollars a square foot?"
She nodded at her knitting. "It's a room in Bushwick. No windows or anything, which makes me sad, but I'm told it's quite a steal at $450 a month."
"A flat in Bushwick, Brooklyn? That sounds horrific. I think my closet is larger than a hundred and fifty square feet."
She laughed. "I don't doubt that, Mr. Griffin."
As she glanced over, he rubbed his chest idly. Oh, that bare chest with all those muscles. She needed to quit peeking over or she was likely to get herself into trouble.
"Just call me Griffin if we're going to sit here in bed together," he mused, rubbing his chest. "Feels weird otherwise. So you're renting a hole of an apartment in a terrible part of the city. Does Hunter not pay you very well?"
Oh, dear. "Mr. Hunter pays me very nicely, sir. I just try to live frugally so I can send money home to Mama and them."
"God, your language is appalling. Mama and them, indeed. That's not English."
"It is."
"Really? Where in the grammar books do you suppose they cover 'and them'? Who, pray tell, is 'them'?"
"My sisters and my Nana and my Pepaw-"
He waved a hand. "You know what? I'm sorry I asked. Never mind. Please, continue with your horrific tale of woe."
Maylee was silent. He was mocking her, wasn't he? She couldn't exactly tell him off, so she just said nothing at all.
He sighed and rubbed his face. "So you send money home? Why not get a job closer to where you were?"
"Mama wants me to be successful," she said softly, and was surprised by the ache of homesickness that swelled in her. "She said all the truly successful, dynamic people live in the big city, and that I should go there. She said I was such a good daughter that I didn't deserve to end up stuck in the backwoods with a bunch of hillbillies for the rest of my life." Tears pricked Maylee's eyes. She loved those "hillbillies" and would have stayed with them forever, if they'd have let her. "Plus, I have two younger sisters and I'm trying to set a good example for them, so I can't come home with my tail tucked between my legs the first time someone breaks into my apartment, you know? I'm a Meriweather, and we don't give up."